Religion of the field Negro : on Black secularism and Black theology / Vincent W. Lloyd.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Lloyd, Vincent W., 1982- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Black theology.

Secularism--United States.

Secularism.

Political theology and race.

United States.

African Americans--Religion.

African Americans.

Political theology and race--United States.

Physical Description:

285 pages ; 24 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

New York : Fordham University Press, 2018.

Summary:

Black theology has lost its direction. To reclaim its original power and to advance racial-justice struggles today, black theology must fully embrace blackness and theology. But multiculturalism and religious pluralism have boxed in black theology, forcing it to speak in terms dictated by a power structure founded on white supremacy. In Religion of the field Negro, Vincent W. Lloyd advances and develops black theology immodestly, privileging the perspective of African Americans and employing a distinctively theological analysis. As Lloyd argues, secularism is entangled with the disciplining impulses of modernity, with neoliberal economics, and with Western imperialism-but it also contaminates and castrates black theology. Inspired by critics of secularism in other fields, Religion of the Field Negro probes the subtle ways in which religion is excluded and managed in black culture. Using Barack Obama, Huey Newton, and Steve Biko as case studies, it shows how criticism and grassroots organizing must go hand-in-hand. But scholars of black theology too often ignore the theoretical insights of secular black studies scholars, and race theorists too often ignore the critical insights of religious thinkers. Religion of the Field Negro brings together vibrant scholarly conversations that have remained at a distance from one another until now. Weaving theological sources, critical theory, and cultural analysis, this book offers new answers to pressing questions about race and justice, love and hope, theorizing and organizing, and the role of whites in black struggle. The insights of James Cone are developed together with those of James Baldwin, Sylvia Wynter, and Achille Mbembe, all in the service of developing a political-theological vision that motivates us to challenge the racist paradigms of white supremacy. Book jacket.

Contents:

Cone

Baldwin

Mbembe

Derrida, Agamben, Wynter

Questions

What Is Black Tradition?

. What Is Black Organizing?

For What Are Blacks to Hope?

For What Are Whites to Hope?

Exempla

The Revelation of Race: On Steve Biko

The Racial Messiah: On Huey P. Newton

The Postracial Saint: On Barack Obama

The Race of the Soul: On Gillian Rose

Coda: The Birth of the Black Church.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780823277636

0823277631

9780823277643

082327764X

OCLC:

1004981708